Sky Fall Legend

by Ivory Scott

  Chapter nine

  Targeted!

  "Icy, my heart, under no circumstances can you repeat this to anyone." Said Lord Osiris solemnly.

  Lady Isis and little Jodye Trill both nodded with grave faces. This made the Lord and Ke Si glance at each other in secret. This kid was just too much.

  "I have awakened my second combat soul," a gold light shone in the Lord's eyes, and he took a deep breath before continuing, "It is a legendary Sky Wolf. So, naturally, the expert diviners of God Wolf Redoubt became aware of me the moment it awakened."

  "But I don't understand! How is that possible? You've been a Sage for over 30 years. How did you suddenly awaken another soul?" asked the First Lady in confusion.

  "This is my life's biggest secret. My origin pool was damaged in my youth, before my adoption. I was basically crippled." Said Lord Osiris with a dazed expression, as he reminisced on the past, "The old leader and Grand Patriarch of House Trilleck, Abercorn Trilleck, found the broken me and used a precious treasure of his to heal me over time. Because of this, I was eventually able to cultivate as a saint until I met Rocky, who became my combat soul and helped me refine an origin artifact. I wasn't a Sage until I was seventeen."

  Lady Isis was silent as she processed this new information, shocked and a bit disappointed that she knew so little about her own 'man.' Their situation may be complicated, but she truly adored this man, almost to the point of worshiping the ground he walked on.

  "Lord pops," suddenly, little Jodye Trill spoke up.

  "What is it, son?" Lord Osiris raised his eyebrow, as he had nearly forgotten about the toddler in his wife's arms that was smarter than a five-year-old sage brat but hadn't yet learned when not to speak.

  "Was your second combat soul also crippled when you were little?" Asked Jodye Trill. He was particularly curious about this point. Lady Isis' eyes seem to flash momentarily looking at her son. She hadn't even thought this far yet, as she was distracted. Joseph had brought her back to the crux of the issue.

  Lord Osiris was a bit surprised but answered openly, "Indeed, it was, son. The Sky Wolf was my original Combat Soul. When my origin pool was crippled, and my cultivation wasted, I lost the connection with my Sky Wolf. By the time I learned what a Sky Wolf was, I had nearly forgotten about my own. Now, the link between myself and it has been reestablished due to a lucky encounter," Lord Osiris might as well have been talking to his son in another language, for Jodye only understood about 30% of the words spoken.

  "This is also the reason I've brought you here, my son. To be honest, I have suddenly become wary of you. No, I am not kidding Icy," said his father, as his mother gave a questioning look.

  "This is a feeling from deep within my soul. Many of the elders with wolf souls, or contracted wolf spirits, have also felt varying levels of this wariness. There is only one reasonable explanation for this." The Lord paused and observed his son again, deep meaning in his eyes. "The power inside of you, Joseph, surpasses us all...and by no small margin. Many feel threatened by this. The son of the Lord won't necessarily be the next lord, only those who win the qualifications can be such. However, with your status as a young lord, in addition to your talent, it makes you too intimidating."

  As the Lord's words faded, so did the world of darkness and Ke Si along with it. The five elders still remained in their previous positions, as if no time had passed at all. This made Jodye Trill silently reevaluate the talent of this butler.

  "Little Jo, what we are going to do next is called a Source Spirit Assessment. You're currently in what we call a 'half-awake' state. If the assessment is successful, you can awaken your host soul. Once this happens, you will soon make your first attempt at subduing and refining a fate artifact." Said Osiris Trilleck with a hint of excitement in his voice. "Elder Fontaine, if you would do the honors, please."

  The blonde haired and blue eyed Elder Fontaine had pale white skin and was holding a folding fan-shaped origin tool, which he snapped closed at this moment. He was very handsome, tall and imposing, with a blonde beard that hung to his mid-chest.

  His face was identical to Mercer Trilleck, though his hair and eyes were entirely different. Even though he had some gray in his hair near the temples and few wrinkles, the majority of his shoulder-length hair was platinum blonde, giving his noble countenance certain youthful glow.

  This was Heavenly Rain Fontaine, an Honored Elder of House Trilleck and a member of the Five Element Wolf pack. His official title was Heavenly Rain, while Fontaine Trilleck was his actual name. From inside of his blue and black robes, Elder Fontaine pulled out a transparent gemstone the size of a child's fist and a small jade box.

  "Please listen carefully, Joseph," begins Elder Fontaine.

  Jodye Trill's little face turned solemn, and he straightened his back, leaning back in his mother's arm. He was accurately and very clearly imitating his father's previous posture. "Elder Fontaine, when we are in these chambers you will refer to me only as Little Lord. Do you understand me, elder?"

  Elder Fontaine and others wore dumbfounded facial expressions before they all burst into laughter. Rather than upset, they were all highly impressed. Such a learning speed was unique to this child alone, amongst millions. He was already imitating his father's demeanor flawlessly!

  He didn't even have to be told to do so, he probably just wanted to be like his old man. You couldn't teach some kids this if you tried for all their lives. The little lady Kamila Trilleck, for example, was wild and near uncontrollable unless she was around her little brother. This had become well known in the entire Saint Anubis City.

  All the elders felt delighted by this, especially Elder Fontaine, who had previously had the least amount of contact with the child among the group. Osiris Trilleck was like a god among men on the battlefield. Having such an abnormal heir seemed to be fate, "Yes, that is this one's mistake little lord. Forgive me."

  "Bwahaha, come, Elder Fontaine, tell me what you want to say." Said Jodye Trill, imitating Lord Osiris' trademark laugh. Osiris Trilleck didn't know whether to laugh or cry, as he ruffled the hair of this little blue-eyed clone. They say you shouldn't favor one child over the other, but the House Lord found himself growing ever fonder of this kid.

  "Reporting to the little lord," while speaking Elder Fontaine opened up the tiny jade box. In a mere couple of seconds, the entire area was filled with a sweet fragrance, coming out from the box. "This, in my left hand, is the Fate Reveal Pill. We are going to have you ingest this. Your current spiritual state is at half step awake. This pill will push you the rest of the way."

  Upon hearing this, the youth instantly got excited as his eyes shined. Wasn't this a free lunch?

  Elder Fontaine continued his explanation, "Once you refine the energy within, it will push you to level 2 spiritual force, the Host Reveal stage. Perhaps, it may push you even further, as this pill was designed to help children who had yet to reach level 1 spiritual force. However, it's true that you are a bit young..." As he said this Elder Fontaine gave Jodye a peculiar look, "Well, do not worry I will help you refine this pill. In my right hand is a Fate Gem. When this gem undergoes a change, that change will represent your soul force compatibility."

  Elder Fontaine handed the pill to lady Isis. Isis then, reluctantly, told Jodye Trill to open his mouth. Little Jodye complied wordlessly and swallowed the pill. He immediately felt a burning hot energy journey through his small frame. However, this simply couldn't compare to the slow and torturous days of tempering his skin with astral might at night.

  After confirming the third young lord had swallowed the pill, Elder Fontaine put one index finger on Jodye's glabella, and then placed the other index finger underneath his navel. Jodye felt a different spiritual sense probe his body, making him completely uncomfortable all over. This was like being touched on your insides by a stranger. Lady Isis saw her son's slightly pained face and grew instantly enraged, but was also immediately suppressed when Lord Osiris grabbed her hand.

  The Lord had real
ized lately how protective this woman was over the boy, it was indeed on an abnormal level.

  A pale violet light appeared on the tip of Elder Fontaine's fingers, as he guided the energies in Jodye Trill's tiny body. This was so Jodye could quickly absorb the magical properties of the pill. Fontaine was impressed because many children would whine and complain during this process. Refining such a pill was not easy. However, Jodye merely frowned as the process continued.

  Jodye really wanted to cast his spiritual sense to check the interior condition of his body, but he decided against it in the end. With a foreign invader currently operating his energy flows wantonly in his body, he couldn't be careless. He was still afraid of the consequences of revealing too much at his age. After all, who knows what they would have done if he behaved suspiciously earlier!

  After a couple of minutes, Jodye Trill felt a wild energy tingle below his navel, then what felt like a spark. Dense milky white energy that he didn't know was there, started pouring out several different places in his body, traveling all over before it converged into that spot beneath his navel.

  The Fate Gem in Elder Fontaine's hands begin to glow blue, and he immediately released it, as the gem starts to float.

  "Magic force!" exclaimed Elder Mercer.

  At this moment the Fate Gem changed from a bright blue to a deep crimson-purple. Then, it turned again to be to multicolored and prismatic.

  "Voo...Voodoo Force," this time it was the House Lord Osiris Trilleck's turn to be shocked.

  "Both Voodoo and Magic...he has the Chaotic Force potential." Elder Fontaine's hands were trembling as he stared at the Fate Gem with a feverish look in his eyes.

  Every sage is born with an affinity to the heaven-earth primary force that their bodies are naturally compatible with. The level of affinity, however, is different for all. Except for those who possess unique physiques, these primary forces are almost always Magic, Voodoo, or Pure Force. Chaos Force, however, is the result of having both Magic Life and Voodoo Death Force.

  Although actually comprehending chaos force was unreasonably rare, just being to use magic and curses together was a tremendous advantage over those who could only do one or the other. After all, Lord Osiris himself could only use the curse powers of voodoo force. Lord Osiris made a firm decision in his heart. They must protect this boy, at all costs!

  He was their future!

  The fate gem suddenly started to spin. It shined dazzlingly and emitted and low hum for about half an incense stick of time. Next, the fate gem transformed into a multicolored electric sphere of power and floated there for another half incense stick of time. Afterward, the area around the fate gem slightly trembled, as the electrical sphere dissipated and shrunk back into its gem form.

  The fate gem then emitted a sharp silver and green glow, as a wolf howl was accompanied by all the heaven-earth primary force in the surroundings being pulled into the gem. This howl which shook the soul of all the elders in the room, other than lady Isis, was powerful and unique. The fate gem then exploded utterly, in a multicolored mess of forces.

  All the adults in the room wore stunned faces. Jodye Trill, himself, was staring at the spot of the explosion with his jaw hanging open.

  "So much for a low profile…"

  Jodye Trill once again struggled out of his mother's embrace, but a sliver of her power stayed attached to him like a collar. Ignoring this degrading feeling, he dashed over to the mark left over from the explosion.

  Suddenly, out of nowhere the trillions of particles suddenly converged right in front of Jodye to become the Fate Gem! Except, rather than being small and transparent, it was now twice the size of before and the same sapphire blue as Jodye's eyes.

  Lord Osiris' entire body began to tremble when he saw the Fate Gem reassemble, "Impossible...no way..."

  "It...it exploded.." stammered Elder Mercer. Didn't that mean?

  "S Grade," Lady Isis, Lord Osiris, and Elder Fontaine spoke in unison.

  "It's fine that it exploded, it's fine..." sighed Elder Mercer, "mine too exploded, in the end, you know...my master was quite upset, although he was also happy...but his...the boy...it revived? What does that mean?"

  Jodye was a bit puzzled by their reactions. Was the result right, or evil? He couldn't read the atmosphere. All he knew for sure was that he was a big deal right now. These guys were looking at him as if they saw something terrifying. Jodye had just begun walking back towards his mother when he noticed the Fate Gem calmly floating behind him as he walked, so he stopped. Then he ran over to his dad's legs. Then he over to Elder Fontaine's. Then over to his mother again. At this point, he felt he had it confirmed.

  "Mom help me! The Fate Gem is possessed. Ghost gem! It's a ghost gem!" Said Little Jodye Trill tugging on his mother's dress and pointing at the Gem as he floored the room once again. The Hall was filled with boisterous laughter, and the tension in the room once again evaporated slightly. These elders thought that this youth was the most exciting brat they had met so far. Even he, himself, was starting to be convinced of his age.

  Being a kid was fun, and the perfect cover. Jodye secretly fantasized about how many more people he could have killed as an assassin if he had been able to do so as a child. He would've surely been rich.

  "Wait..." suddenly Jodye had a terrible idea, that tempted him a lot. As a former part-time villain, his sense of morality was already questionable in the first place.

  "No, Joseph this is wonderful!" Exclaimed the lady Isis, her ice phoenix-like eyes fervent, as she lifted her son in the air and spun him around three times before placing him down. Her face was flushed red, and she had a proud smile on her face. That right, she was indeed proud of her son's potential. "This fate gem has been reborn as a destiny star! The laws of fate have fused with it and acknowledged you as a master! Once you reach the destiny platform, this gem will evolve into a second artifact! Now you will be an elite among the elite, destined to stand above the myriad of other warriors."

  After Lady Isis' powerful words faded, the entire room went silent, as all eyes fell on her. Lady Isis was momentarily startled before she remembered that her background was truly deeper than these bumpkins. She composed herself, speaking eloquently to the crowd.

  "As you all should know, a Sage class expert's main soul is actually a fusion between a host soul and a hollow soul," Lady Isis picked up her son and held him in her arms, in spite of his protests, as she turned to face the men in the room. "When a child is born with a Sage Body their host soul is in a state of hibernation, making their potential null."

  As she was speaking, Lady Isis let go of Jodye who remained floating in the air, totally shocking the boy himself. It felt as if she was still holding him! Yet she was clearly no longer doing so. Isis tied her long wavy braids into a ponytail before one of her rings flashed, and brand new Fate Gem appeared in her hand.

  Jodye's eyes were wide with shock, "Did she just pull that out of her ring!? Rings can hold things? Why has no one shown me one of these before?"

  Seriously?

  She was using magic to levitate him, yet the boy was more concerned about her spatial ring. How was this a child? She just could never distract him efficiently, he noticed everything.

  "My lady, you were saying?" urged Lord Osiris, eager to know the fantastic aspects of his seed.

  Lady Isis rolled her eyes at their son and then paused for a moment as if in thought, "The fate gem is a mysterious object refined by top-level Saint class experts to assess the potential of an individual's main soul. The reaction of the fate gem is a weakened reflection of the main soul's primary affinities..."

  "Ma," Jodye Trill suddenly called out while tugging his mother's clothes from mid-air.

  "Yes, my little heartbeat, what is it?" asked Lady Isis, glancing at her son as if she had been waiting for him to speak. Subconsciously, she had started taking the child's thoughts and statements more seriously. It was no longer similar to the way she would talk to an infant.

  "How come Saints
can make things for a Sage? Shouldn't there be differences between the two?" asked the ever inquisitive young Jodye Trill.

  "This..." his mother could think of no simple answer to this complicated question her son asked. Lady Isis had been expecting him to ask her about the spatial ring on her finger, before demanding to have one of his own. This was why she hadn't shown him this ring before, after all. Still, that would have been simpler as she was already prepared.

  However, to explain where the boy's thinking was wrong here, she would first need to emphasize the importance of force comprehension. In her heart, it was too soon for her son to learn of or even understand such matters! He had his entire childhood ahead of him.

  "Bwahaha," However, right when Lady Isis was about to lightly brush off the question, the House Lord interjected with his trademark boisterous laugh.

  "My son, while it is true that Sages and Saints cultivate differently, the end goal is the same. Once you reach the highest levels of strength, the comprehension of the different powerful forces of the earth and the sky is what will truly separate the weak from the strong. Saints are proficient in controlling fate power, which gives them powerful and unique traits and abilities. The ability to refine items such as the fate gem is merely one example of such abilities." Osiris Trilleck believed today, more than ever, that his son's potential was genuinely monstrous. It might be limitless even. His questions showed a level of mental maturity that was just unheard of at his age.

  The House Lord's thoughts differed from his wife. He had decided to spare no effort in cultivating the mind of this baby ancestor. In the Lord's mind, little Joseph Trilleck was like a giant sponge that just soaked up all the information it was given like it was liquid. The boy had never asked the same question twice, and once his questions were answered, his understanding of the subject would become profound enough to connect two pieces of information together to form a third.

  This was not, by any means, the level of an infant or even a child.

  Perhaps for an eleven-year-old, with a Sophmore rank Sage cultivation, such behavior would not be unusual. However, on a powerless, untrained, one-year-old, with no cultivation to speak of? It was plainly absurd.